


A Secret to Keep

by Feneris



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Backstory, Explainations, Gen, How Grisha and Carla Met
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-12
Updated: 2013-10-12
Packaged: 2017-12-29 06:04:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1001874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Feneris/pseuds/Feneris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For SnK Kink Meme:</p>
<p>For Grisha Yeager it all starts with a tragedy. </p>
<p>An overturned cart, a mysterious young woman, and her baby. </p>
<p>But there is more to little Eren that meets the eye, and Carla herself bares the weight of many secrets.</p>
<p>Secrets that could one day mean the difference for all of humanity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Secret to Keep

**Author's Note:**

> Another fill the SnK Kink meme. The prompt for this one was to take the theory that Eren was always a titan shifter (and the possibility that Carla Yeager came from beyond the walls.) and provide an explanation for things that hopefully made sense.
> 
> I believe I did a fairly good job out of it. (Thought that will likely all fall to pieces considering what keeps getting revealed in the manga)

For Grisha Jeager, it all starts with a tragedy.

A cart loaded with crates of fruit broke an axle outside his house and overturned, falling onto a passing young women and her baby.

He's outside in minutes, helping to move the cart and lift the crates off the two. The women was lucky. While she was knocked out, she had only broken her arm and was largely unhurt.

The same could not be said for the baby. A crate loaded with apples had fallen on the infant, crushing one of its arms and half its ribs. While the child is still alive, it can't even draw enough breath to cry. Its a tragedy, but Grisha knows there's nothing he can do to save the babe's life.

He has two bystanders carry the young woman inside and lay her on a bed in one of the spare rooms he has for long-term patients. The baby he places in a spare cradle and covers with a blanket. The idea of leaving the kid to die doesn't sit well with him. But he reminds himself that there is nothing he can do that would save the baby's life, and the mother still needs to be treated.

He is halfway through setting the young woman's arm, when the dying baby suddenly lets out several choked wheezes, then an ear shattering cry.

Grisha pulls back the blanket, and cannot believe what he sees. There is steam rising from the infant's body and Grisha can see cracked and broken ribs sliding back into place. The arm which was once crushed and useless is failing against the side of the crib, completely whole and healthy.

Its miraculous.

Of course, miraculous or not, even Grisha cannot stand the constant screaming for long. He has absolutely no experience dealing with babies on his own. (He always had their mothers there with him.) Therefore the only thing he can think to do is to pick the baby up and place it on its mother's chest.

It works thankfully. The infant stops crying and snuggles into his mother's chest, falling asleep shortly after.

\---

The young woman comes to a few minutes after Grisha finishes setting her arm. She glances around in panic, not recognizing her surroundings.

"Eren!"

Then she noticed the baby lying on her chest and immediately relaxes. She wraps an arm around the sleeping child and lets out a breath of relief. Then she turns to Grisha. "Where...?"

"You were in an accident." Grisha explains. "Your in my house. I'm Dr. Jeager, I've been looking after you. And you are?"

"Carla," she answers, absently stroking the patch of hair on the baby's head. "This is my son Eren." She doesn't give a family name, and Grisha does not ask for one. "Was I badly hurt? What about Eren?"

"You broke your arm in the accident," Grisha explained. "but that's the worst of it. Eren as you can see is fine. However..." he pauses. "Mrs. Carla, when they brought your son in, he was in such bad condition that I believed he was lost. But as you can see he's made a recovery that is nothing less than miraculous in only a few hours. How is it that he is able..."

He stops in mid sentence. Carla is giving him a look of pure fear, and is clutching Eren tight to her chest. A part of Grisha want to push on, to find out just what she knows about her son's miraculous healing. It gnaws at him. The sheer potential of that ability...

But he pushes that part aside, even as it chews at his curiosity. "I'm sorry Mrs. Carla. I appear to have blundered into a sensitive subject. You don't need to tell me anything." Grisha clears his throat and changes the subject. "Do you have any friends or family that you would like me to contact?"

Carla relaxes slightly, than shakes her head. "No. No friends or family."

Grisha frowns. "Do you have anywhere to stay?"

She shakes her head again. "No... but I can find something. I won't burden you. I'm sure I'll be able to pay you in a few days..."

Grisha holds up his hand to stop her. "There's no need for that Mrs. Carla. You can stay here as long as you need to. As for payment, you don't owe me a thing. I'm a doctor, it's my duty to help people. I would not think of charging you for having the misfortune of being at the wrong place at the wrong time."

"But..."

"Please Mrs. Carla. It's no burden at all. The least I can do is offer you and your son a warm roof." He pushed himself to his feet. "You don't have to give me an answer now. I'll give you some time alone with your son. I have a cook coming by in a couple of hours to make dinner if you and Eren care to join me."

He paused at the doorway. "And Mrs. Carla. You have my word, I won't tell a soul about what I saw today."

As he closed the door behind him. He could just hear Carla whisper.

"Thank you."

\---

ts been over three months, and Eren has finally stopped waking the entire neighborhood in the middle of the night. The boy has a strong set of lungs and is unafraid of telling everyone exactly what he thinks.

Carla has so far been unsuccessful in finding a place to stay, and has appointed herself as the live-in housekeeper in the meantime. In truth, Grisha doesn't mind having her around, and while its nice having a housekeeper, Carla doesn't owe him a thing. No matter how many nights Eren's shrieks wake him up.

Of course, a part of him wants desperately to discover the secret of Eren's amazing healing. But he's resigned himself to the idea that whatever secret Carla knows, she does not wish to tell it to anyone.

Its to his great surprise then, when there is a knock on his study door and Carla enters.

"Dr. Jeager, you've been very kind to me and Eren and I know you want an explanation for what happened." She takes a deep breath. "I've given it a lot of thought, and I think you deserve to hear the whole story."

Grisha leans back in his chair and regards Carla with surprise. "I'm listening."

And so she tells him. Its a long story, lasting most of the morning, and when its done it leaves Grisha in shock.

Villages outside of the walls! People who can turn into titans! Its all so fantastical that Grisha almost doesn't believe it. No matter how he stretches his mind, he cannot imagine that little Eren could possibly turn into one of those great murderous monsters that lurk outside the Walls.

But, he has seen Eren's healing first hand. There's no lie in Carla's face. He knows it's real.

Carla clears her throat. "I... I understand if you don't want me and Eren living with you after what I told you..."

He holds up his hand. "Mrs. Carla. I think I still need some time to digest all this. However, that doesn't change anything. You two are still welcome to stay here as long as you like." He takes a deep breath to steady his nerves and takes the plunge. "In fact, I would like it very much if you did choose to stay."

Carla's face breaks into a smile of pure relief. "Thank you Dr. Jeager. Thank you."

She climbs to her feet, bows and moves to the door.

"Carla," he calls out on a whim. "Call me Grisha, please."

She smiles warmly at him and nods.

\---

The next three years past peacefully. Carla and Eren quickly become a permanent part of his home and medical practice. There's a few rumors about their relationship and more than a few speculate that Eren is in fact Grisha's illegitimate son. But Grisha finds that they don't bother him. (In fact he almost wishes they were true.)

Then the incident happens.

He's out making one of his regular house calls when it occurs. This house call in particular was more about keeping an old, bedridden hunter company than anything particularly medical, and Carla had come along to help cook the old man a few meals.

Of course the man's old cabin wasn't particularly child-proof, and after Eren had gotten his hand caught in yet another mousetrap, Carla had taken him with her to go pick mushrooms.

Grisha was just finishing up a hand of Crib with the old man, when he heard Carla's scream echo from the forest.

It was followed almost immediately by an earthshaking roar.

He's out the door almost immediately and racing through the woods. What he finds is nothing he could have anticipated.

Carla is huddled under a tree, she has Eren pressed tightly to her chest and is sobbing uncontrollably. Unresponsive to Eren's insistent questions of "Mommy, whats wrong?"

There are two mutilated bodies lying nearby. Robbers or worse, Grisha assumes. But what catches his attention is the dissolving remains of a titan. Its at least somewhere between three and four meters by Grisha's estimation, and he wonders somewhere in the back of his head if it will get bigger as Eren gets older.

He reaches down, gives Carla's shoulders a tiny shake, and guides her and Eren back to the cabin.

In the end, the old man accepts Grisha's edited version of events with a huff and a "good riddance." He even goes so far as to suggest that Grisha bury the bodies in his unused back garden, remarking that the soil will be easier to dig.

Carla doesn't say a thing the whole time. She just holds Eren tight until they get home, whereupon she sets off to work without saying a word.

That night, she knocks on Grisha's study. She tells him all her worries and fears over Eren. That the military and the government will find him and dissect him. That Eren will loose control, go on a rampage and be killed. That people will notice how his injuries heal with a puff of steam. That one day her village will find them and track them down.

She begs him to do something! At the very least find some way for Eren to hide his powers. He cured a plague! Surely he could cure her son of titan shifting.

It marks the real difference between them, Grisha realizes. To him Eren has this great blessing that so many could benefit from. To Carla, its a curse her son should never have had inflicted on him.

But, as much as he wants to protest. Carla's reasons are very good ones, and he doesn't have the heart to say no to her.

The next day he cloisters himself in his laboratory, and begins work on the blocking serum.

\---

In the end, the blocking serum takes only a few months to complete. Add in another month for testing and Grisha has something that he is almost certain will block Eren's powers and won't harm him.

It should have taken years to get this far. But, he had gotten lucky and made some few chance discoveries which had accelerated his research. All he needs is one little enzyme. One that will bond to specific reaction sites, and prevent the transformation from even starting. One little injection is all that is needed to turn Eren from a titan shifter into a normal little boy.

It can't come soon enough. The rumors have taken a shift. People are noticing that there's something odd about Eren. They haven't put their finger on exactly what, but they know something is not adding up.

Grisha and Carla are already making plans to move.

He gives Eren the blocking injection as part of the boy's regular vaccinations. Aside from some short-term memory loss, it doesn't hurt him. Of course, Grisha has no idea if it has even worked.

They get their answer barely a week later. Eren is an energetic little boy, and gets scrapes and bruises rather easily. This time it involves him tripping on a loose stone outside the house and cutting his knee on some broken glass.

He howls in pain as Grisha disinfects the wound and pulls the pieces of broken glass out. But, there is no steam rising from the cut, nor is the flesh knitting back together at an unnatural pace. For better or worse, the serum has worked, and while Carla's face shows all the worry and concern any mother should feel, Grisha can see there are undercurrents of relief and thankfulness mixed in.

They complete their preparations and move before the month is out. Their choice of destination is unusual. Most people move inwards whenever possible, trying to put as many walls between them and the titans as they can. Shiganshina is about as far away from the inner district as you can get.

But the people there are welcoming, and no one so much as bats an eye in disbelief when Grisha introduces Carla as his wife and Eren as his son.

\---

Its been a slight over six years since then. They've settled in well. As far as the community is concerned, they have always lived there. Eren has even made friends with the Arlert's boy, Armin. Carla is happy. She moves like she has finally been freed from the burden of her son's abilities and whatever horrors she first fled her village to escape.

Its because of that, that Grisha doesn't tell her that he's started work on an unblocking serum. Something that will clear the enzyme from the reaction sites and restore Eren's powers to him.

No matter how many years it has been, he cannot get the image of young Eren recovering from life-threatening injuries in a matter of hours out of his head. The titan shifters fascinate him. There powers are so mysterious and packs so much potential. He can name dozens of people who would give everything they had just to be able to regrow their lost limbs or recover from their crippling injuries. More to the point, he cannot shake the nagging feeling that Eren will need his powers in the future, and that it may mean the difference for all of humanity.

So his research continues in secret from everyone. When Carla asks him why he keeps his lab locked all the time, he replies that he is keeping some dangerous chemicals in there that he doesn't want Eren getting into.

It's mostly the truth. He is keeping chemicals in there, the kind that no parent would want their kids getting their hands on. But its not the main reason the lab is always locked.

While he struggles with the question every day. Grisha has made up his mind. When Eren is older, he will give him the unblocking serum, and let the boy decided for himself what he wants to do with his powers. He'll give Eren the key to his lab as well, so that Eren can understand better what exactly he is.

The weight of the secret doesn't sit well with him as he puts on his coat and gets ready for the night's house call. He's taking Eren with him this time, see if the boy has any taste for medicine.

Who's it tonight? He checks his datebook.

Ah yes. The Ackermans.


End file.
